This Week In Home Entertainment: Noah, Twin Peaks And More

Darren Aronofsky has proven throughout his career that he is capable of stunning visuals and unique storytelling. The director needed both when pursuing the massive movie project, Noah, a story about a biblical flood and thousand of creatures sheltered by one family during the darkest of times. Aronofsky mostly pulls it off, telling a compelling biblical tale with ties to nature, and even monsters of a sort.

Noah isn’t the family-friendly story people only familiar with the title might expect. Early on, we are introduced to a young Noah, who witnesses the death of his father at the hands of a sinning man named Tubal-Cain (Ray Winstone). As a grown-up, Noah (Russell Crowe) strives to live by the more earthly tenets his father taught them, tenets he then teaches his own wife (Jennifer Connelly) and sons (Logan Lerman, Douglass Booth and Leo McHugh Carroll). He begins to have visions about the great flood, and much of the rest of the tale is familiar biblical fodder, portrayed with deep earnest by Crowe and co.

Except there are monsters, angels sent to Earth who now strive to protect Noah and co. as the rain begins to fall. These rock and clay creatures are horrific and burdened-looking, but are mostly kind individuals. They, like the animals and the great flood, are animated spectacularly, creating a visually lush movie with plenty of interesting characters.

If I had any complaint, it’s that the familiar story can be dull on occasion as Aronofsky and Ari Handel’s script strives to push the action forward. But it’s a beautiful movie, provided you are able to see the biblical narrative as more of a literary text than a fact-filled one.

Best Special Feature:: The best special feature is "Iceland: Extreme Beauty." It takes a look at where the film was shot, and it offers up some of the most beautiful shots from the film. Really, that’s the tremendous upshot of shooting a big budget film like this. You can find such stunning landscapes, and it makes the event film seem that much bigger than life. It worked in New Zealand for Lord Of The Rings, and it works here.

Other Bonus Features:
The Ark Interior: A Battle For 300 Cubits
The Ark Interior: Animals Two By Two